I'm an "Extreme Ghostbusters" fan because I was first a "Ghostbusters" fan. The original movie is still one of my favorite comedies which has a lot to do with combining humor that I can appreciate with the ghastly, ghostly elements that horror fans like myself enjoy. Most people know the movies, many know that it was turned into a cartoon series, and some have had the misfortune of thinking they were sitting down to watch Egon, Ray, Peter, and Winston only to discover they were watching a show about a gorilla. How many know there was a short-lived next generation kind of follow-up series?

 

“Extreme Ghostbusters” is a dumb title. Sorry, whoever came up with it, but it is. Back in the day UPN (a network that vanished like a ghostly vapor) was running a handful of animated shows beginning with “Extreme” because I guess they thought it sounded “hip.” Aside from a weak marketing department-created title it was actually quite a good show.

 

The original team is getting on in years and has disbanded due to a lack of paranormal activity thanks to their past efforts. Egon has been teaching a college course on the paranormal, and new attacks from the ethereal plane result in his students forming a new Ghostbusters team. Kylie is the expert on demonology, Roland is the technical whiz, Garrett is the athletic go-getter (despite being confined to a wheelchair), and Eduardo is the slacker who gets a lot of the best comedy lines (kind of like Peter).

 

Despite the mismatched team (or perhaps perfectly matched considering their varied, useful expertise), under Egon's guidance they become effective in dealing with paranormal issues. Each episode sees them face off against a new ghostly challenge backed up by Janine and Slimer.

 

The first thing the show does right is the principal cast which includes some of my favorite voice actors. Maurice LaMarche and Billy West are two people you are going to hear me bring up a lot because they have done so many great voices in their careers. They are Egon and Slimer (respectively). Tara Strong might sound familiar if you are a "Powerpuff Girls" fan (or if you have watched Batman cartoons or any number of other shows over the past several years). She plays Kylie with a New York accent with a tough but intellectual attitude.

 

Alfonso Ribeiro might not be someone you automatically associate with voice acting since he is best known for his work in front of the camera, but he makes Roland come across as someone more than “the token black character.” Roland is brainy, prefers opera to rap, and is the only one who can keep up with Egon when it comes to working with the equipment. It's easy to think going into the show that he's just there to be a rehash of Winston, but the two are vastly different. Roland is actually more like Ray though less childlike and without the occult interests (that's more Kylie's line of interest).

 

Rino Romano plays Eduardo, and Jason Marsden is Garrett. While I was less familiar with them outside of this series for a long time they are both accomplished and terrific. (I met Jason not long ago, and he still has fond memories of Garrett). Eduardo perhaps comes across as a stereotype more than anyone else as a Latino slacker. I think it works because of the precedent set by Peter, and this being a comedy we need someone to pop off goofball lines. He doesn't have the kind of talents that other members of the team bring to the table, but he does prove adept at being able to step up when called for.

 

Garrett is interesting because he is the most athletic yet does not have the use of his legs. He compensates for his lack with fearlessness which ends up being something of a motivator for the rest of the team at times. His athleticism allows him to accomplish things that the other guys can't do when they're up against a rock and a hard place. I like him, though, because even though he's written as very capable he's not some perfect superman. His desire to be seen as fearless causes his pride to get in the way of things sometimes, and he's not above giving Eduardo a hard time.

 

While the regular cast and characters are great some of the bit parts throughout the series could be a lot better. Some of them don't sound natural though they aren't frequent enough to ruin the whole thing.

 

The equipment gets a new look to be more streamlined under the explanation of upgrades. It does make sense that Egon would be able to improve upon his original designs along with new, usually experimental and thus unstable, ideas for a variety of purposes.

 

While this may be nitpicky, in making the heroes more heroic in an action setting the writers have them doing things that are unreasonable. As example, in one episode Roland goes up a robotic construct pulling off moves that only the likes of Jackie Chan could keep up with. It keeps the characters from being as realistic as they could be when they are already pushing against the edges of plausibility because of their fantastic circumstances.

 

On the other hand are some character conflicts not often found in a kid's show. Egon at one point is feeling the ravages of age. He feels like he needs to prove himself useful still but when he does so it comes across as him thinking that Garrett can't do anything because of his handicap. Egon is right mean to the kids in this episode. He and Garrett must both confront their very realistic fears of inadequacy.

 

The animation is mostly pretty good. There are the typical limitations you get with a modest budget TV series: body proportions that don't look right during certain actions, mouths not matching words, coloring errors, etc. It's not going to compare to a big screen Pixar movie, but I've certainly seen far, far worse.

 

How about the ghostly aspect? There's a diversity of ectoplasmic adversaries here which helps keep the series from getting boring. If we were fighting the same ol' same ol' every week we'd turn it off after a couple of weeks, but that's not the case. One criticism though is that the baddies almost always have to look gratuitously monstrous during the big final fight. It starts feeling overdone after a while. An example is Piper who looks mostly normal, though with odd proportions, except for a rather disgusting hole in his belly that dispels ghostly minions. Once the team faces off against him, instead of just leaving him in this form (which, in my opinion, would have made him more creepy) the writer/director turns him into some kind of puffer fish man thing that looks ridiculous. On the other hand are some Hellraiser Cenobite-inspired guys that look fittingly grotesque without ever mutating to ridiculous proportions.

 

One of the fun elements of the series is the tying of it to the original. We have a few of the original characters as regulars, and the rest of the team shows up for a while near the end (played by the original cast members no less). And at least one episode harkens back to a an episode of the original series. A new version of Samhain shows up in the credits and the toy line but unfortunately never appears in the series itself.

 

How about music? The theme song is gritty rock remake of Ray Parker, Jr's Ghostbusters song. My only complaint about it is that there isn't a full song version of it, only the short credit sequence version. I like it so much, though, that I have 3 different versions that I keep in my MP3 playlist with another 3 versions of the closing credits. Jim Latham has done some of the best cartoon theme songs out there (he is tragically underrated  when it comes to these things), but he really knocked it out of the park with this one. I've also been fortunate enough to track down some of the individual bits of score from the series. It's a spooky electronic sound that at times reminds me of Elmer Bernstein's original score while also sometimes making me think of Mark Snow or early Resident Evil video game music.